Questions and answers

Question reference: S6W-17089

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 9 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what projections there are of how much will be raised under each income tax band in 2023-24, based on the tax bands introduced in the Scottish Budget 2023-24.

The Scottish Fiscal Commission are responsible for producing independent forecasts of Scottish Income Tax for the Scottish Budget. Their most recent forecasts published in December 2022 does not include a breakdown of this forecast in terms of revenue raised by taxpayers at their highest marginal rate.

The Scottish Government estimates that the Income Tax policy changes announced, for 2023-24 alone, will add £519 million to the Scottish Budget.

Question reference: S6W-17096

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Graeme Dey on 9 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what the total number of students is that attended a Scottish further education college, in each year since 2007.

Information on the number of students attending a college in Scotland is published by the Scottish Funding Council. The latest publication contains a 10 year timeseries.

College Statistics 2021-22 (sfc.ac.uk)

Due to a recent methodology change, a timeseries isn’t available back to 2007. The below table provides a consistent timeseries of student headcount, enrolments and full-time equivalent figures back to 2007.

Academic Year	Headcount	Enrolments	Full-time Equivalent
2006-07	354,152	468,155	129,378
2007-08	368,717	489,610	131,423
2008-09	364,998	483,472	133,374
2009-10	338,223	438,522	134,918
2010-11	298,578	383,005	134,547
2011-12	252,132	320,646	133,199
2012-13	238,758	297,586	131,421
2013-14	238,371	299,828	132,942
2014-15	226,898	297,011	131,619
2015-16	226,795	281,051	129,500
2016-17	235,187	291,849	132,493
2017-18	242,488	303,115	131,953
2018-19	264,858	328,889	129,821
2019-20	239,004	302,092	127,683
2020-21	213,135	277,620	128,559
2021-22	236,730	322,332	129,175

Source: Scottish Funding Council

Question reference: S6W-17088

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Tuesday, 25 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 9 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government how much revenue was raised under each income tax band, and what proportion each amount represents of the total income tax take, broken down by each financial year since the introduction of the Scottish Rate of Income Tax to 2022-23.

Control over the rates and bands of non-savings non-dividends income tax has been devolved to the Scottish Parliament since 2017-18.

His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) publish Outturn statistics annually, showing the revenue raised from Scottish Income Tax for the tax year prior. These statistics show revenue raised from taxpayers at their highest marginal rate, that is, the Income Tax band that a taxpayer would pay their next pound of Income Tax into.

Outturn statistics from 2016-17 to 2020-21 are available on the UK Government website, with the most recently available publication being found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/scottish-income-tax-outturn-statistics-2020-to-2021/scottish-income-tax-outturn-statistics-2020-to-2021.

For figures relating to 2021-22 and 2022-23, the Scottish Fiscal Commission (SFC) are responsible for forecasting Scottish Income Tax revenue. The SFC do not currently publish a breakdown of this forecast in terms of revenue raised by taxpayers at their highest marginal rate.

The next Outturn publication is expected to be in July 2023, and will outline the revenue raised by marginal rate by band for the tax year 2021-22. Figures for 2022-23 will be available in Summer 2024.

Question reference: S6W-17296

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 4 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what the social care staff vacancy rate is in the (a) public, (b) private and (c) third sector.

Question reference: S6W-17295

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 4 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what the social care staff vacancy rate is in each local authority area across Scotland.

Question reference: S6W-17279

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 26 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Emma Roddick on 4 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government (a) how many people and (b) what percentage of the population it estimates will be in the over 65 age category in each year from 2023 to 2050.

The latest population projections data for Scotland is available on the Office for National Statistics website . This includes various breakdowns, including by age group and single year of age. For ease, see the following table for the data requested on the projected population aged 65 and over up to mid-2050:

Year	All ages	Population aged 65 and over	Percentage of population aged 65 and over
Mid-2023	5,489,769	1,107,470	20.2%
Mid-2024	5,496,877	1,127,637	20.5%
Mid-2025	5,503,484	1,147,579	20.9%
Mid-2026	5,509,360	1,169,102	21.2%
Mid-2027	5,514,526	1,191,700	21.6%
Mid-2028	5,518,937	1,215,309	22.0%
Mid-2029	5,522,526	1,238,261	22.4%
Mid-2030	5,525,221	1,261,192	22.8%
Mid-2031	5,527,133	1,280,837	23.2%
Mid-2032	5,528,207	1,300,159	23.5%
Mid-2033	5,528,447	1,318,279	23.8%
Mid-2034	5,527,868	1,334,311	24.1%
Mid-2035	5,526,606	1,346,860	24.4%
Mid-2036	5,524,773	1,359,699	24.6%
Mid-2037	5,522,508	1,369,348	24.8%
Mid-2038	5,519,943	1,374,596	24.9%
Mid-2039	5,517,081	1,375,690	24.9%
Mid-2040	5,513,969	1,375,327	24.9%
Mid-2041	5,510,584	1,374,342	24.9%
Mid-2042	5,506,932	1,370,115	24.9%
Mid-2043	5,503,019	1,366,775	24.8%
Mid-2044	5,498,874	1,367,703	24.9%
Mid-2045	5,494,411	1,371,034	25.0%
Mid-2046	5,489,501	1,375,623	25.1%
Mid-2047	5,484,097	1,380,687	25.2%
Mid-2048	5,478,126	1,384,825	25.3%
Mid-2049	5,471,545	1,388,349	25.4%
Mid-2050	5,464,337	1,393,950	25.5%

Question reference: S6O-02211

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 03 May 2023
Current Status: Taken in the Chamber on 10 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to ensure the long-term sustainability of general practice.

Question reference: S6W-17284

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Wednesday, 19 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 2 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what its assessment is of how many social care staff are required to meet demand.

There are more than 1,200 social care providers across Scotland, with local authorities responsible for providing or commissioning services. Local authorities and Health and Social Care Partnerships will wish to ensure that, in providing a range of services, their workforce planning arrangements take full account of the need to have safe and sustainable numbers of staff.

The latest figures published by Public Health Scotland show that, on 17 April, the total number of hours of social care support yet to be provided was 38,324.

Question reference: S6W-17293

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 2 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what the average waiting time is between someone being assessed and then advised that they are in need of social care and the provision being put in place.

Information on Social Care Eligibility and Waiting times is collected and published by the Scottish Government and this includes waiting times between completion of a community care assessment and delivery of personal care services (for which there is a six week target). The latest data are publicly available via the following link: Social Care Eligibility Criteria And Waiting Times, Scotland, 2020-21 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot).

Many Local Authorities have reported difficulty in providing the information asked for in this data collection, which has had a significant impact on the robustness of the information available for analysis. We are working with Public Health Scotland (PHS) to consider the future of this data and are developing plans to capture waiting times data within existing Social Care collections returned to PHS, aiming to make it more straightforward for partnerships to provide data, and in turn resulting in more complete and consistent data in the future.

For those able to provide data for 2020-21, around 81% of people aged 65 and over waited less than 6 weeks between completion of a community care assessment and delivery of a personal care service (based on 15 LAs). For people aged 18-64, this figure was slightly lower at 74% (based on 20 LAs) (see annex 4 of the tables which accompany the release).

Question reference: S6W-17292

Asked by: Alex Rowley, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Thursday, 20 April 2023
Current Status: Answered by Maree Todd on 2 May 2023

To ask the Scottish Government what the average waiting time is between someone being advised that they need to be assessed for social care and an assessment taking place.

Information on Social Care Eligibility and Waiting times is collected and published by the Scottish Government, and includes the waiting times between first contact with services and the completion of a community care assessment. The latest data are publicly available via the following link: Social Care Eligibility Criteria And Waiting Times, Scotland, 2020-21 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot).

Many Local Authorities have reported difficulty in providing the information asked for in this data collection, which has had a significant impact on the robustness of the information available for analysis. We are working with Public Health Scotland (PHS) to consider the future of this data and are developing plans to capture waiting times data within existing Social Care collections returned to PHS, aiming to make it more straightforward for partnerships to provide data, and in turn resulting in more complete and consistent data in the future.

For those able to provide data for 2020-21, around 58% of people aged 65 and over waited less than 2 weeks between first contact and completion of a community care assessment (based on 16 LAs) and 21% waited longer than 6 weeks. For people aged 18-64, just over half (53%) waited up to 4 weeks (based on 19 LAs) with 36% waiting more than 6 weeks. (See annex 3 of the tables which accompany the release).

Chamber and committees